Emergency services on the Chukotsk peninsula in the Russian Far East battled Monday with fires in the tundra scrubland that trapped reindeer flocks and herders and were bearing down on an oil storage depot. One of eight large fires in the Arctic region was four kilometres from the settlement of Omolon and its oil station which holds 3,000 tons of oil products, rescue workers told the Itar-Tass news agency. Some 50 square kilometres of woodland and tundra were burning in the blazes which were sparked by hot summer weather. A rescue helicopter was trying to reach reindeer herders and their flocks after their base 100 kilometres from Omolon was destroyed at the weekend. The herders managed to escape through a ring of fire but the helicopter could not approach because of thick smoke. A total of 74,000 hectares of land were alight Monday in the far eastern regions of Chukotsk, Yakutia and Magadan, news reports said. Forest fires also caused chaos in other parts of Russia in recent days. A blaze in the Voronezh region south of Moscow came within three kilometres of a nuclear waste depository Saturday before firefighters and troops brought it under control. One of the Novovoronezh power plant’s reactors was powered down briefly during the emergency. dpa na wo (back to top) 9 Forest Fires Rage in Russia Far East ITAR-TASS News Agency, August 5, 2001 By Leonid Vinogradov A total of 69,000 hectares of forests, steppes and tundra are engulfed in flames in Russia’s Yakutia, the Magadan region, the Koryak and Chukotka autonomous regions as well as the Khabarovsk region. People and nature fail to cope with the elements raging in the Far Eastern Federal District. According to the Far Eastern regional centre of the Russian Ministry for Emergency Situations, the biggest number of hotbeds of fire, 64, have been registered in Yakutia. A total of 250,000 hectares of forests and steppes have been destroyed by fires this year. According to the emergencies ministry centre, 1,352 people are fighting against fires in the region.Emergency services on the Chukotsk peninsula in the Russian Far East battled Monday with fires in the tundra scrubland that trapped reindeer flocks and herders and were bearing down on an oil storage depot. One of eight large fires in the Arctic region was four kilometres from the settlement of Omolon and its oil station which holds 3,000 tons of oil products, rescue workers told the Itar-Tass news agency. Some 50 square kilometres of woodland and tundra were burning in the blazes which were sparked by hot summer weather. A rescue helicopter was trying to reach reindeer herders and their flocks after their base 100 kilometres from Omolon was destroyed at the weekend. The herders managed to escape through a ring of fire but the helicopter could not approach because of thick smoke. A total of 74,000 hectares of land were alight Monday in the far eastern regions of Chukotsk, Yakutia and Magadan, news reports said. Forest fires also caused chaos in other parts of Russia in recent days. A blaze in the Voronezh region south of Moscow came within three kilometres of a nuclear waste depository Saturday before firefighters and troops brought it under control. One of the Novovoronezh power plant’s reactors was powered down briefly during the emergency.